


The Riceman Cometh

by kingthezeke



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: 18th Century, Rice Smuggling, Thomas is a fucking idiot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-05
Updated: 2016-04-05
Packaged: 2018-05-31 10:40:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6467050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kingthezeke/pseuds/kingthezeke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thomas Jefferson's newborn country could use some help, even if he needs to get his hands dirty in the process. Stealing rice from the Italians isn't a half bad idea, he thinks. The death penalty for rice-smuggling seems a bit extreme, though. He's just praying his pockets don't have any holes in them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Riceman Cometh

His feet were sore and his back was aching considerably. They’d hiked over the Alps, by mule and by foot, just to make it into Northern Italy. Only to turn around and leave the same way they came after an hour or so of sticking around. As the American Minister to France, Thomas spoke French. But as a linguist, he also spoke Italian. And Latin. And Greek. And also, some textbook Spanish. And obviously English. Useful, he thought, because at the time, he was in Italy, facing a potential death sentence. He wanted to be able to understand what they were saying to him when he and Jim were being sentenced to penal death, he figured. But not yet. He hadn’t done anything illegal, yet. _Yet_. In anticipation for the crime, his coat pockets had been checked and checked again, sewed and secured by the Jim, who was walking with him.

It wasn’t too cold outside, and so the sun was baking Thomas in his navy blue overcoat. The sweat was beading on his brow from both the intense heat trapped within the wool outerwear and the anticipation looming in his throat. Jim trailed behind him wordlessly, observing the clouds and the ladybugs that twirled around them occasionally. He was carrying his jacket over his shoulder, his navy waistcoat cut cleanly to accent his waist. Jefferson could appreciate beauty, especially when it came to his own staff. He swallowed the lump in his throat as they passed through on the dirt path of the rice field. He’d explained to the first few men that he and Jim were on a diplomatic mission to cross Northern Italy into Switzerland, to make it back to Paris. It was dire and they were lost. He’d tugged the mule, Dolphin, into a trot.

They were trying to appear unsuspicious and casual, strolling over the hills, making polite conversation with the men in the rice fields. Jim spoke no Italian, but Jefferson was quite gifted, it appeared. Jim was a slave, who also spoke English and French. He felt inferior, now on uncharted territory, relying on the same man who had enslaved him to translate for him. Thomas was doing nothing of the sort.

“Good morning to you, sirs!” a few men yelled in rapid Italian.

Thomas reciprocated warmly. “And good morning to you all. Nice day, yes?”

A man husking rice across the field noticed Thomas’ large coat and yelled, “If you like sweating your gonads out, I suppose!”

This earned a hearty laugh from all other Italian men, as well as Thomas Jefferson, who placed his hand on the small of his slave’s back, to steer him through the field. The Italians spoke no English, so Thomas said to Jim, “Don’t look, Jimmy, but there are some unattended rice carts on the far end of th—I said don’t look!—you distract them, and I’ll get the rice.”

“With all due respect, sir, I don’t speak any Italian!” Jim protested.

“That’s why I told you to _distract_ them. When I’m done, I’ll call you to leave. Play nice.” He handed Jim the rope that pulled Dolphin, and turned the gentle, guiding hand into a shove, launching the meek boy into the grass. This drew the attention of a few men. Dolphin had begun to graze eagerly, pulling up grass and roots without a care in the world. Jim’s nerves, however, were on edge. With one look at him, the Italians’ squinting in the sun became cracks of laughter, and they approached him, speaking in that damned curlicue language he was beginning to loathe, and Jim had no idea what was going on. They were petting the mule and nudging Jim playfully. He resisted the urge to look back at Jefferson, who was then easing his way to the unoccupied cart.

He could hear the Jefferson laugh in response to some of the things shouted at him. Jim stared at them all, and asked,

“Can any of you speak English?” They’d exchanged glances, and the familiar humiliation from when he first arrived in France (speaking no French) flooded back. “I’m James.” He’s said, in an attempt to communicate _something_ , at least.

“Jesus, don’t tell them your _name_!” Jefferson yelled accusingly from across the field, horrorstricken.

The Italians stared at them in confusion.

“I’m,” Jim gestured with more exaggeration, “ _Henry_.”

“Henry? _Anch'io sono chiamato_ Henry!” One man’s face lit up with pure joy, and Jim smiled awkwardly.

“He says his name is Henry, too,” Jefferson called from somewhere behind him.

Jim heeded this and smiled again. They began clamoring, probing in Italian, smiling, jeering. They kept asking about Dolphin, who was neither charmed nor repulsed by the audience she’d gathered.

Meanwhile, Thomas was strolling to the wooden cart. It did not appear to be guarded, which was strange. He flexed his fingers in his overcoat pockets, skimming the men around him. The Savoy authorities of Italy had made it very clear that they didn’t want _anyone_ exporting the grain. The penalty for what he and Jim were trying to do was a capital one. Death. He kept an ear out for Jim, in case he needed to be rescued, but the time for that did not come. He snuck around the cart and dropped into a crouch. Immediately, he began shoving handfuls of rice into his awaiting pockets.

He heard the men howling with laughter, but he could also hear Jimmy’s nervous tittering, and Dolphin’s conversational braying. If he was not mistaken, he could hear Italian baby-talk, repeatedly chirping “ _you’re a pretty boy_! _Such a pretty, pretty boy_!” Thomas wanted to inform them that Dolphin was, in fact, a female. So, he was rash to assume that whoever it was, was talking to Dolphin. Thomas continued to stash rice in every pocket he could find, his hands shaking with a nervousness he didn’t dare expose to the nineteen year old he’d travelled with. He knew what Jim was wondering, but was too respectful and kindhearted to ask aloud. He wanted to know why he and Thomas were risking their lives for a few handfuls of rice. If they made it back alive, he would explain it to him, but he didn’t dare make a sound now.

He found himself sneaking away, without drawing attention or making a mess. He was careful to comb any of the seeds that the wind may have caught in his afro. Once he had put enough distance between himself and the cart, he called,

“Ja— _Henry_ , my boy! What are you doing back there?” He shoved his hands in his pockets to compensate for the bulkiness that otherwise wouldn’t be there. His heart was rattling in his chest, pounding against his lungs. But Jim looked up at him, and smiled.

“Coming, sir!” he sauntered up to him, tugging the stubborn molly along, proud to see he’d successfully carried out their “diplomatic mission.”

Thomas gave both his and Jim’s farewells in Italian as they continued the walk downhill, but preparing to turn and walk north again, toward the Alps. Their mission was far from complete, as they still had to cross the border, mail the seeds back to America, and not get caught in the process, Thomas explained once they were far enough away from the harvest.

“It’s not a matter of if we do it fast enough, it’s a matter of if we get it done,” he murmured, bracing himself for the steep hills. “Time will pass sooner if we don’t think about it.”

“Sir, we’ve been travelling for a week now on foot. I don’t mean to step out of my place when I ask you this, but why have we gone through so much for a pocketful of _rice_?” Jim asked innocently, slipping his arms through the sleeves of his jacket as the wind picked up. Dolphin brayed.

“Because,” Thomas sighed with defeat. There would truly be no point for Jim to risk his life, without a true realization of what he was risking it for. They could have still gotten caught at that point, so he said, “For the United States, Jimmy. For our nascent country. It’s going to help—the rice isn’t doing too well back home. This rice—from Italy—it grows in dry land, so farmers won’t get sick from the swamps anymore. It’s going to help the economy.”

“Is that worth dying for, sir?” Jim inquired, with Thomas sparing him a look. He was an awful human being, with no exceptions, Jim had always thought (and even in that moment, he still did, and forever would after that) but the lengths he would go to for his newborn country certainly were admirable.  

“Look, Jimmy, I’m not a soldier,” Thomas admitted as they hiked on, fluffing out his afro. Jim didn’t need to be reminded of this. “Never was. This vassal? It’s made to host dinner parties and bake cheesy pasta for those dinner parties. I’ve never been in a war, and I don’t think I’d ever want to be. But doing this for my country is me risking my life the same way General Washington does. Maybe it’s less extreme because I don’t have people who want to kill me,”—Jim snorted, but Thomas ignored him—“But I’m doing what I can with what I have for what I want.”

“And what would that be, sir?” Jim asked absentmindedly.

There was a moment of silence as Thomas thought. And finally, after groping the rice thoughtfully, he said, “Well, what I _don’t_ want…is for the birth of our nation to be a false alarm, James. I want it to _shake_ the world when it emerges from the ground. I want to make sure that before I die, I’ve done all I could to help raise it. And if smuggling and potentially facing the death penalty is the only way to do that, that’s what I’ll do.”

Jim went on thinking it was honorable for Thomas to commit to something as perilous as stealing rice; he kept his mouth shut, in an attempt to suppress a laugh, as the man transferred the grains from his pockets into the leather sack hanging from Dolphin, arrogantly muttering about the patriotism he showed. "I should be considered a veteran for what I've done, Jimmy," he even sighed at some point. Jim didn't respond, for fear that he would dissolve into laughter upon opening his mouth. There were some grains of rice stuck in Thomas' hair, still. Jim didn't bother to remove them, or even notify him of it. He just steered Dolphin gently, listening to Thomas ramble about the prized recipe he uses for dinner parties. It was slow evening, and an even slower venture back to Paris. The rate at which Thomas bragged about their escapade would get them turned it, Jim was certain. He was never going to stop telling the story of how he saved his country with a grain of rice. The locals of the Alps referred to him as  _The Riceman_.

**Author's Note:**

> yo yo yo, hope you liked that! It was just an idea that popped into my head one night. The rice-smuggling [actually happened](http://mentalfloss.com/article/59700/6-brazen-acts-culinary-thievery) btw. And he had a mule named [Dolphin](http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/_Mr_Jefferson_s_Personal_Appearance_and_Habits_an_excerpt_from_The_Private_Life_of_Thomas_Jefferson_by_Hamilton_W_Pierson_1862) (❀◦‿◦) I'm not sure if she was the one accompanied him over the Alps, though, and I'm not sure if he went with [James Hemings](https://www.monticello.org/site/plantation-and-slavery/james-hemings) or if he went alone.  
> oh whale.  
> you can reach me [here](romaas-aesthetics.tumlr.com) with questions, comments, prompts or anything else. Ciao!


End file.
